Rip Curl Boardmasters 2008 Festival

Well the lineup for this year’s Rip Curl Boardmasters 2008 Music Festival is out and already its looking very promising with big names on the main stage including the Groove Armada, The Pidgeon Detectivs, The Zutons, and The Futureheads the weekend looks set to be a fantastic bash all round both sport and music wise. Its a shame to see Ghost of a Thousand on the kiddie stage yet again, not because its a shame they’re not on the main stage, more because its a shame that they have to be there at all. Who needs talent when you can have a manager with music industry ties.

The overall event takes place from the 4th to the 11th of August this year and includes some of the world’s best surfers in a pro surfing tournament, skaters in a skating event, bmxers in a bmx event, and hot women, in a bikini competition. Nice.

In addition to the main stage and the kiddie stage, ‘beach sessions’ will also be taking place every night at the beach bar – apparently Enter Shikari are opening up the first night in this tent, which sounds very, very promising indeed, and rumour has it that surf clothing superstars Surfdome (sister comapny to Wavehouse, the creators of the indoor surfing machine) will be in attendance throughout the event.

I’m going to have to see if I can make it across to Fistral beach I think!

The only thing that I think of thats missing, where are the kitesurfers?

Paramore Are Officially Awsome

T4 famed band Paramore aren’t actually as ‘new and fresh’ as you think, in fact their most recent songs were released on an album about 2 years ago now. Nevertheless I for one am glad that my eyes have been opened to this fantastic trio. At first I just liked the song (Misery Business), then her voice grew on me a great deal, kind of like Kelly Clarkson but better.

Then recently I watched this youtube video of an acoustic version of the song, and my respect for them went to a whole new level.

Lead singer Hayley’s voice, even in such a raw acoustic session is absolutely incredible, something that one assumes with today’s recording technology is generally merely generated for the record and played back during ‘live performances’. Not so with paramore, there are no vocal effects or help needed with Hayley as she literally stands out a mile from the thousands of other female fronted rock bands. The difference between her and the others is that she hits every note effortlessly, she has great tone, she sings with genuine emotion, and she has 2 very very good guitarists supporting her.

Oh, and she’s hot too.

I’ll give you two guesses what’s going on my waterproof mp3 player this weekend!

James Blunt Should Die

I am sitting here in my office, southern FM is playing through the radio (how unfortunate), and all I can hear, is the teeth grinding, kidney squeezing, testicular killing, mind numbing, anything-but heart wrenching voice of James the prat Blunt.

In all seriousness, if I wanted to hear the voice of an 8 year old whinging and moaning about how difficult her life was, then I would go to a primary school, and find an 8 year old girl to sing to me. The fact remains that I don’t have any interest in inflicting this shrill noise upon my unsuspecting eardrums, and they would far rather listen to something decent, so James the munt Blunt does not register on that list.

This shrill boy from Wiltshire (oh yes, rather, indeed) was in fact christened ‘James Hillier Blount’ but deemed himself important enough to need to change it for more of a ‘rockstar’ alternative. He should have taken an events management london job to be honest rather than have cursed us all with is putrid excuse for ‘music’. Yet another reason for him to be shot, but who’s counting.

Today, I think we have concluded that James Hillier Fairy Blunt is the worst thing in the history of mankind.

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What Is ‘New’ Music?

From Plan B to Britney Spears, nowadays music isn’t just ‘Rock’ or ‘Rap’. Every genre has a sub-genre and sub-sub-genre, so where is one to start on the ladder of prosidy?

Sadly for some, and very gladly for others, the days of top of the pops are over. The times when the charts defined good music are actually passing and a whole new scope of artists are breaking through in ways that don’t conform with the old standards. I’m not saying its the dawn of a new millennium for the music world, its more like the end of the previous one.

But where does that leave us? What IS this ‘new’ music that’s finally coming out into the open, and what makes it so different from what’s around already?

Previously artists were defined by the amount of financial backing they had from their’ respective record labels. If you got signed to a big enough label, and they paid for enough promotion, you were pretty much guaranteed to be in the charts, and there for, sell lots and lots of records.

Now however, the industry has matured with the help of the internet into a new shape where the consumer has access to virtually limitless artists whether or not they have any sort of record deal. Shops aren’t the only place to go for music anymore, and as new people are discovered who DON’T have a big wallet behind them, more new and different music is coming through to the general public, and increasingly artist websites are being used to new levels.

So what is the point of this blog?

To find out who they are.